| | | | President Trump's Hollow Threat: Wright | | President Trump's pledge that there will be a "big price to pay" for the suspected chemical gas attack in Syria has echoes of President Obama's infamous "red line," Robin Wright says in the New Yorker. But the current President is just as likely as his predecessor to find it's easier to issue a threat than find an effective way of acting on it.
For the United States, "there are few targets in Syria that Russia and Iran could not rebuild with their much more sizable presence in the country. After Trump's cruise-missile attack on a Syrian air base, last spring, the local governor announced that the damage had been repaired and flights had resumed several days after the strike," Wright says.
"The truth is that little is likely to markedly change the military balance on the ground—or the outcome of the war. With the help of Russian airpower, as well as Iranian and Hezbollah manpower, the Assad regime has simply retaken too much territory, including most of Syria's major cities. During the past year, it has knitted together patches of recaptured lands to make a more governable whole. Meanwhile, many opposition forces, such as the besieged rebels in Douma and eastern Ghouta, outside Damascus, now face almost impossible odds." "Assad already has unraveled the global taboo against chemical weapons, in the process exposing the incoherence of the international community. Syria has exposed the international liberal order as a convenient illusion. Western bromides of 'never again' meant nothing when a determined dictator with hefty international backers committed crimes against humanity," Cambanis writes.
Why now? Assad wants to "subdue the remaining rebels in Syria, with an eye toward [those] remaining in rebel-held Idlib province. A particularly heinous death for the holdouts in Ghouta, according to this military logic, might discourage the rebels in Idlib from fighting to the bitter end. Equally important, however, is the desire to corral Trump as Syria, Russia, and Iran did his predecessor, Barack Obama." "Most of the $100 billion or so in financing that the country will ultimately need to rebuild can only be found from US friends and allies. That money provides a certain amount of leverage—not enough to push Assad literally out of power, but perhaps enough to coax him into forming a successor government with broader representation, and to persuade Moscow to help us in the effort," they write. "Western funds should not flow to Assad or the regions he controls until he steps down."
| | China: Getting Ready to Get Jamming? | | | China appears to have taken another step in its "creeping militarization" of the South China Sea with the installation of equipment "capable of jamming communications and radar systems," write Michael R. Gordon in Washington and Jeremy Page in the Wall Street Journal. That makes things even more complicated for the United States.
"China says its island-building is for defensive purposes only, but the activity has stirred fears that it could use the outposts to enforce territorial claims that overlap with those of Brunei, Malaysia, Taiwan and Vietnam, as well as the Philippines, which is a US treaty ally. In the last year or so, China has tried to smooth relations with other claimants while continuing work on the islands," they write.
"While Chinese military personnel are at the Spratly outposts and Chinese ships dock there, China has yet to station ground units or fighter planes on the artificial islands, US officials say. Nor have surface-to-air missiles or antiship cruise missiles been deployed in the Spratlys, though spots to install such weapons have been prepared, US officials said.
"But China's ability to quickly shift military assets to the outposts is a serious concern for the Pentagon since it could enable China to control vital trade routes, exclude other claimants from disputed areas and interfere with the US military's plans to defend Taiwan." | | The Most Important Country on Climate Change | | | President Trump may have withdrawn from the Paris climate accord, but America's shift toward renewable energy looks set to continue. Ditto with China, writes Nick Butler for the Financial Times. But a question remains over arguably the most important country of all in climate terms: India.
"India has 1.4 billion people and by 2025 should overtake China as the most populous country," Butler notes.
"In per capita terms, Indian energy consumption is still only around one-sixth of Europe's — but that means enormous room for expansion. With even limited disposable income comes the demand for cars, fridges and airline flights.
"Coal is dominant, accounting for 45 percent of total energy demand and 80 percent of electricity. In some parts of India, solar and wind power generation are growing and so is the use of nuclear power. But these low-carbon sources remain a fraction of total supply — just 2 percent in 2016 and on the IEA projection still only 10 percent by 2040. That will leave coal producing almost 60 percent of electricity and meeting 45 percent of total energy demand." | | Why Europe's Far-Right Swoons Over Orban | | Far-right parties in Europe were quick to embrace Sunday's landslide parliamentary election win for Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban and his party. After all, he's everything they've wished for, writes Paul Hockenos for CNN Opinion.
"Orban's vision of a Europe of Fatherlands, as he calls it, is exactly what the far rightists have been calling for over decades: a conglomeration of loosely bound independent, security-minded, ethnically homogeneous countries in a zero-sum EU," Hockenos writes.
"A large part of Orban's appeal beyond Hungary's borders is that he gets away with it. Hungary remains a EU member in good standing, even if it has been rapped on the knuckles a few times. Fidesz [Orban's party] remains in the European People's Party in the EU, which includes Germany's Christian Democrats and several dozen other reputable conservative parties."
| | Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg is scheduled to appear before a joint hearing of the Senate Judiciary and Commerce committees on Tuesday, followed by the House Energy and Commerce Committee on Wednesday, to discuss the Cambridge Analytica data scandal. His message? It's my fault. According to Zuckerberg's prepared remarks, released by the House Committee on Monday: "We didn't take a broad enough view of our responsibility, and that was a big mistake. It was my mistake, and I'm sorry. I started Facebook, I run it, and I'm responsible for what happens here."
President Trump is expected to attend the Summit of the Americas in Peru, which begins Friday. But Patricio Navia warns in Americas Quarterly that Trump's appearance will merely be a reminder that his administration doesn't really have an agenda for US-Latin America ties. "Trump's policy toward the region has so far consisted of going back and forth on the renegotiation of NAFTA, promising harsher policies toward Cuba without delivering anything substantial, and talking tough on Venezuela without doing all that much to back up his words."
Mike Pompeo is expected to appear Thursday in front of a key Senate panel as part of his nomination for secretary of State. Foreign Policy reports that with Republican Sen. Rand Paul already voicing his opposition over Pompeo's support for the Iraq War, it could be rough going. | | | | | | |
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